Page Forty Nine: One of Those Days

…When it’s pouring rain and you have no umbrella and you’re lugging a big awkward painting and it’s around lunchtime so it’s impossible to catch a cab… Oh, and it’s the middle of the Depression. Yep.

Of course I couldn’t resist tucking in various bits of historical paraphernalia and going off on more research than necessary… That glimpse of a cab took ages of research. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find accurate reference of a New York taxicab likely to be in use between about 1932 and 1936? (Pro tip: if you’re looking for historical car reference, search for the websites of companies that rent historic cars for films and events. Reference bonanza.) The “El” refers to the old elevated trains, long gone now except for the West Side High Line which is now a fancy-schmancy park. The guy selling pencils is a nod to the many classic comic collections I read over and over as a kid… I remember the depression-era comics always seemed to feature guys selling pencils or apples for a dollar, and that stuck in my head, so I had to sneak one in. The barely visible outfits of ladies on their lunch break were gleaned from browsing my costume books, of course (because I’ll take any excuse to browse costume books…)